TV Pop Diaries
Pop Music on British Television 1955 - 1999

After his final Thames Television show was pitted against Top of the Pops Everett decided to move back to the BBC where he was then broadcasting a Saturday morning show for Radio 2. He had also made his presence felt on BBC1’s Blankety Blank as Terry Wogan’s foil.

His departure from Thames was considered unusual as they had snatched Morecambe & Wise, Mike Yarwood and Dick Emery from the BBC, and here was Everett doing what he does best, the complete opposite of what you would expect him to do. His writers Barry Cryer and Ray Cameron came with him, but this time he would be in front of an audience. Kenny introduced a new batch of characters to the show, but by far the best and most loved was failing Hollywood starlet Cupid Stunt (nearly called Mary Hinge), forever regaling the sordid plot of whatever wretched film she was promoting to a cardboard cut-out of Michael Parkinson, and assuring him that despite the incredulous plot it was all "done in the best possible taste."

The producer of his previous Thames series Philip Jones made it clear to Everett and the BBC that Everett couldn’t use the characters he’d created for his previous shows, to which Everett replied “if Thames want to sue, they know our address." Everett would later go on to call Jones a "cunt" at the Montreux TV festival and then suggested that people join him in urinating off a balcony in the hope that Jones was passing beneath. Having been to Montreux before with his Thames series Everett claimed "Last time we were just practising. Now we have concentrated on real jokes. If I lose I think I'll walk into the lake, but if I win I'll walk over it." After confronting Jones at the festival by repeating his insult to his face Jones replied "Mike Yarwood and Morecambe and Wise had the grace to say thank you to the people who have given them their chance. I was very sad Kenny could not be like that."

Everett was also becoming a chat show regular, while the BBC1 series would also get a summer repeat on BBC2.

There would only be one musical act each week this time around, but they would be in the studio with him. Big name music acts like The Police and U2 appeared on the show such was the respect the music industry had for Everett. Kenny himself became a chart star with Snot Rap, which took him into the UK top ten in 1983 and featured the characters Sid Snot and Cupid Stunt, while the show’s theme Electro People, performed by seventies hit-makers Fox, was a minor hit.

This time around Everett would have a co-star, Brazilian actress Cleo Roccos, who would become one of Everett’s best friends until his death.

It was during the taping of one sketch where he, dressed as Quasimodo, was held aloft by the lighting gantry at Television Centre roasting for over half an hour that he decided that it was enough and decided to quit the show. Talking to the Daily Mirror in May 1989 he confessed "I'm fed up of getting tarted up in silly dresses, playing Queen Victoria and Lord Nelson and being vulgar. Besides, those false tits are very heavy, and I'm fed up with perspiring under sticky make-up for three hours and putting stupid wigs on."

He would however return to Television Centre a few months later in June 1988 for Brainstorm, a science-based quiz show, followed by another, Gibberish. These would be his last series for TV as his progressing illness made television appearances too tiring, although he continued on Capital Radio's oldies station until a few months before his death.

THE KENNY EVERETT TELEVISION SHOW

BBC1

24th December 1981 - 18th January 1988